Intrinsic Fundamental Frequency(Fo) of Vowels in the Esophageal Speech

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J Korean Soc Laryngol Phoniatr Logop > Volume 9(2); 1998 > Article

Journal of The Korean Society of Laryngology, Phoniatrics and Logopedics 1998;9(2): 142-146.

식도음성의 고유기저주파수 발현 현상

홍기환¹, 김성완¹, 김현기²

¹전북대학교 의과대학 이비인후과학교실²전북대학교 의과대학 음성실험실

Intrinsic Fundamental Frequency(Fo) of Vowels in the Esophageal Speech

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ABSTRACT

Background : It has been established that the fundamental frequency(Fo) of the vowels varies systemically as a function of vowel height. Specifically, high vowels have a higher Fo than low vowels. Two major explanations or hypotheses dominate contemporary accounts of fired to explain the mechanisms underlying intrinsic variation in vowel Fo, source-tract coupling hypothesis and tongue-pull hypothesis. Objectives : Total laryngectomy surgery necessiates removal of all structures between the hyoid bone and the tracheal rings. Therefore, the assumption that no direct interconnection exists between the tongue and pharyngoesophageal segment that would mediate systematic variation in vowel Fo appears quite reasonable. If tongue-pull hypothesis is correct, systemic differences in Fo between high versus low vowels produced by esophageal speakers would not Or expected. We analyzed the Fo in the vowels of esophageal voice. Materials and method : The subjects were 11 cases of laryngectomee patients with fluent esophageal voice. The five essential vowels were recorded and analyzed with computer speech analysis system(Computerized Speech Lab). The Fo was measured using acoustic waveform, automatically and manually, and narrow band spectral analysis.
Results
: The results of this study reveal that intrinsic variation in vowel Fo is clearly evident in esophageal speech. By analysis using acoustic waveform automatically, the signals were too irregular to measure the Fo precisely. So the data from automatic analysis of acoustic waveform is not logical. But the Fo by measuring with manually calculated acoustic waveform or narrowband spectral analysis resulted in acceptable results. These results were interpreted to support neither the source-tract coupling nor the tongue-pull hypotheses and led us to offer an alternative explanation to account for intrinsic variation of Fo.

KEY WORDS： Esophageal speech;Intrinsic fundamental frequency;